New satellite photos show objects on water near potential MH370 crash site

New satellite photos show objects on water near potential MH370 crash site

Newly-discovered satellite photos may have given scientists a fresh clue as to the location of Malaysian Airlines 370, one of the world’s most famous aviation mysteries.

The four satellite photos, shot less than a month after MH370 disappeared in 2014, show 70 objects drifting on the ocean in the vicinity of the predicted crash zone, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) said Wednesday.

“The ATSB had to negotiate the release of the native resolution imagery from the French Ministry of Defense,” a spokesman told CNN.

Treat with caution

The images were shot in an area to the west of the original search zone, where scientists said in December MH370 might be located.

David Griffin, a physical oceanographer at Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) who helped analyze the pictures, said the photos could help pinpoint MH370’s location to an “unprecedented” degree — if they’re actually showing plane debris.

“It hangs on the impossible thing to know which is whether these were actual pieces of the plane,” he told CNN.

In addition, analysis of the last satellite readings from the missing plane showed it was spiraling fast towards the sea when it stopped transmitting.

Australian, Malaysian and Chinese governments called off the search for MH370 in January 2017.

Despite that, relatives of the missing passengers, who were mainly Chinese, have refused to give up on the missing airliner and have said they are planning to continue the search through a private company.

Photos provided by French military

The four images were provided to Australian authorities by the French military for analysis on 2 March, three years after they were taken.

They were captured by France’s Airbus PLEIADES satellite in an area which was not covered as part of the initial underwater search, according to the ATSB.

It is, however, in a location where scientists said earlier this year the missing plane could be found.

“We’ve already chosen an area where we think the plane was likely to have crashed, the proposed new search area” Griffin told CNN.

“So let’s make a prediction, if you’re right, and that’s where the plane crashed, if we had a close look at the ocean … and saw no strange images we’d think ‘Oh gee we’re wrong’ (but) indeed we looked at the images and saw all these strange objects,”said Griffin.

“It’s not conclusive but it’s the best you could hope for.”

The official search effort would be continued if “credible” new evidence was found, Australia’s transport minister Darren Chester said in January.